


One Giant Step for Katie

by mandykaysfic



Series: 12 days of Christmas 2014 [1]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-27
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-03 20:19:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2886257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mandykaysfic/pseuds/mandykaysfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Katie Brown, along with a group of scientists, takes her first trip through the Stargate, prior to going to Atlantis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Giant Step for Katie

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 12 days of Christmas, 2014  
>  _On the first day of Christmas...the beginning of a journey._

It was supposed to be bigger. Not that it wasn't impressive; it was. It was amazing, marvelous, awe-inspiring, in the truest definitions of the words. It was simply from the minute she'd been recruited to the Stargate program, Katie had pictured the gateway to other worlds, to other galaxies, as, well, _big_.

Surreptitiously, she clenched her fists, fighting the old urge to bite her fingernails as she stood with eleven other scientists, ready to make their first trip to another planet. They were to spend six hours at the SGC's third Alpha site, P4X-650. It didn't have a name, only the alpha-numeric designation assigned by someone, one of the astronomers, she supposed. 

Dr Corrigan, one of the anthropologists making the trip, complained about its uninhabited state, hence the lack of a name, but Katie was secretly relieved. She still hadn't met her first alien, although she'd seen Teal'c around the base a number of times. As long as she had some time to get her first look at alien plant life in its natural environment rather than in a laboratory, she'd be happy. Oh, there'd be nothing new to discover today, but in the Pegasus galaxy...cures for cancer, new painkillers, superfoods to feed growing populations. Katie couldn't wait. She gazed unseeingly at the Stargate as she pictured the brand new specimen that would one day bear her name. Not Katie or Brown; she'd use her middle name. 

"Your shoelace."

Katie jumped at the voice sounding by her ear. "What?"

"Your shoelace is undone. You don't want to begin your trip with a trip."

She couldn't help the groan that escaped as she bent to retie her wayward lace. "Thanks," she murmured as she straightened. "Thanks, um..." 

"Moore. John Moore. Oceanographer. You're Doctor Brown, aren't you? It's exciting, isn't it? I've been looking forward to this since they told us."

"Me too. Yes, I'm Katie Brown."

"Xenobiology, right?"

"Botany, actually."

"I wish we were going to P3R-213. I've studied the available data on its geophysical fluid dynamics and--"

When SG16 called the waiting scientists to attention, Katie breathed a sigh of relief. Dr Moore talked solidly for five minutes, regaling her with details of ocean currents, plate tectonics and substance fluxation, or abuse, or something; she wasn't exactly sure. Lieutenant Wolfe began the safety speech and she turned from Moore to pay close attention to the dos and don'ts of gate travel.

She held her breath as she watched the inner ring spin, the chevrons light up and engage, and finally the blue 'kawoosh' of the energy vortex, then breathed out with a gentle 'kawoosh' of her own. She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to memorize exactly how she felt. 

When the order came to move out, Moore pushed his way to the front of the pack. The woman who'd been standing just in front of Katie and Dr Moore, and whom he'd jostled aside in his rush to go through the gate, turned back to Katie and rolled her eyes. Katie shook her head, gave a wry smile in return and followed her future colleague, stepping up onto the ramp and into the event horizon.

END


End file.
